M.A.I.L. (Maille Artisans International League) is an international community of artisans and volunteers dedicated to the advancement of the chainmaille artform. We aim to encourage the sharing and spreading of information, archiving as many techniques and weaves as possible.

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Heya!
This article explains my opinions on maille, how it has helped me out, and how it has helped me become a better person.
What is maille? Webster's defines it as the action of delivering a message to another party...oh wait, wrong mail. Maille is the process of weaving together hundreds upon thousands of rings. That sounds better.
Before I get too in depth, you will need some personal history. I started to weave chainmaille nearly two years ago. About three years ago, I accepted myself as being depressed. I saw therapists and consulted many friends. Nothing seemed to help until a friend showed me how to make chainmaille. From then on, my progress improved.
Chainmaille taught me a lot of things; one of the great ones is patience. The one comment I get most when I tell people about what I do is that 'I don't have the patience for that'. Maille has taught me that if I wish to accomplish anything, there will always be a need for patience. If you learn to curb your impatience, you can conquer anything.
I once told a friend my view on life. 'I take life as I do chainmaille. I take one ring, open it, weave it, close it. Simple as that.' In life, when something happens, we follow it through, see where it plays out, and it's over with. Never forget to move on. Don't wallow in the past.
Chainmaille gives each and every one of us time to ourselves, gives us a chance to be ourselves, express ourselves, and gives everyone the gift of what we can do, by ourselves. (whoa . . I gotta stop, I'm sounding like a preacher.) When something goes wrong in our lives, we all need time to think. I've had a lot of things wrong, so I took chainmaille as an escape, time for myself to think. Along with the help of my girlfriend, I managed to get rid of all the bad things in my life. All of those bad things were holding me back from being who I really wanted to be.
Over the past 2 years, I've learned an incredible amount. here are a few things that I discovered while making maille:
1) Aggressive Resistance gets you nowhere. I am a great admirer of Ghandi. He taught the Passive Resistance philosophy that helped to free India, and I believe that this theory is applicable to every aspect of life.
2) There will always be jerks. I've found that no matter how nice you are to everyone, there will always be someone who just is a jerk, and there's nothing you can do about it.
3) There is always a better side. No matter how bad things get in life, there will be a better side in the end.
4) It's not possible to make Full Persian of out 18 gauge 3/16" ID rings. Just like chainmaille, not everything in life will turn out the way you wanted it to. Accept that. When you do, you'll find a way to see the good side to everything.
Like everything you make, maille takes on your spirit. Each mailler has his or her own style and way of weaving. To other people, they may be just a bunch of tiny rings. To us, they're fingerprints. We decide how it looks.
My most important thing that I learned is not to let anyone or anything control your life. Personally, I try to avoid the need for material goods. I've tried to avoid things that I feel are unnecessary (like eating animals; if you wanna argue, feel free to PM or email me [watching tv is another, but i feel it's only justified if i'm watching the simpsons, seinfeld, and curb your enthusiasm]) in life. If someone or something is controlling you or your destiny, don't let it. You will never be happy. Three years ago, I accepted that no matter how much I tried against it, I will end up like everyone else. I'll graduate, get a job, do that for a few years, raise a family, then retire and die. A year later. I found chainmaille; now I've taken control, and I know that's not what will happen to me.
Chainmaille is a great thing. Apply it to your life, learn what it teaches, and you might just become yourself. This reminds me of something Ghandi said, which I think is very true, as it relates to truth itself, and speaks of life. "Truth is by nature self-evident, as soon as you remove the cobwebs of ignorance that surround it, it shines clear."

Original URL: http://www.mailleartisans.org/articles/articledisplay.php?key=169

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